Gear

View The Images in Windows Explorer

June 27, 2018 by A. Cemal Ekin

When browsing the folders with tons of images using Windows File Explorer, do you see application-based icons for different file formats and no preview in the preview window like in the image above? Then, I have a solution for you! And, it is highly affordable. If you could View the images in Windows Explorer, you could maintain the files more easily, you could pick the correct file and drop it on an application to open it and in general be a lot better informed about what is where on your storage drive.

In the earlier incarnations of Windows, Microsoft used to provide a downloadable CODEC pack that would allow viewing a good number of file formats in File Explorer. For some reason, this download is no longer available from Microsoft and I felt the lack of it until I found the solution last year. Many file formats are COded and they need to be DECoded to be viewed. Image files are in this category. The Windows File Explorer can preview some image file formats and show small thumbnails but cannot handle most digital camera formats.

My searches for viewing the images in Windows Explorer lead me to a genuinely useful piece of software, the FastPictureViewer CODEC Pack. It supports a very large number of file formats and there is nothing you need to do after downloading and installing it on your computer. From that point on, you will be able to set the file display as icons in three different sizes and your preview panel, when activated, will display a larger version of the file currently selected. In other words, the opening image which could not display anything but application icons will turn into a screen like the one below.

… to this

From this …

As you can see, the FastPictureViewer CODEC Pack can handle all the image files you can throw at it, there are many formats I have not even heard of that it can handle. Additionally, you can very easily set the icon size to display small, medium, large, and extra large icons on the file display panel. See the images below to get an idea. The first image is showing the large and the others, extra large icons. The last image shows the context menu when you Right-Click on a file name where you can pick the icon size.

You can try out the CODEC Pack if you like, but even the paid version is highly affordable at $9.99 for what it does. Although I could not make heads or tails of their FastPictureViewer, the CODEC Pack is worth the money.

A Low-Cost Highly Functional Panorama Head

April 21, 2018 by A. Cemal Ekin

Stitching images sequentially photographed has been around for quite a while and the software that can assemble the images have come a long way from the early days of panoramic photography. I enjoy creating wide-view images using single or multi-row stitching as the vista covered takes a different look after all is said and done. I have been using a simple nodal point slider (see the annotated image) clamped on my tripod head for single row panoramas and have successfully tilted the head up and down to create multi-row stitched photographs. However, doing this consistently without the proper equipment can be at least time-consuming and easily turn into a frustrating experience.

A commercially available panorama head can start around $200 and go upwards over $1,500. And then, there is the GigaPan automated device that captures the required number of images given the top left and bottom right locations but that too costs close to $1,000. So, I started looking for alternatives on eBay and managed to assemble a perfectly functional panorama head that can do single- or multiple-row panorama photography relatively painless. I will share the parts I purchased on eBay with no endorsement of the vendor as I do not know much about them. There are many vendors who can offer the similar parts should you be interested in assembling a pano head yourself.

What Is Needed For A Panorama Head

The fundamental components of a pano head are:

Horizontal and vertical support bars
Vertical bar mounting clamp
Nodal point slider bar
Fixed-angle step rotator (optional)

I have had a nodal point slider bar from my earlier panoramic photography experience. I purchased the following, but anything comparable will serve the purpose and there are many choices on eBay:

2x200mm Quick Release Plate for Tripod Ball Head Compatible with Arca Swiss ($24.43)
360 Degree Panoramic Camera Ball Head Clamp Tripod Head with Quick Release Plate ($22.22)
Andoer DH-55 Ball Head With 1/4″ Quick Release Plate for Camera Tripod I3W2 ($47.03)
You may also need: 200mm Nodal Rail Slide Plate QR Clamp Macro Panoramic Bracket For Arca Swiss RRS ($18.15)

They all shipped from China and took anywhere between 2-3 weeks to arrive. The last item is not essential if your tripod head can rotate while keeping everything level and you are careful to rotate it at necessary angles to cover the scene. This device, a click-stop rotator, has a screw-in knob that determines the angle of rotation so from one shot to the next the rotation will always be at the same angle, say 15-degrees if that is what your lens calls for. The only extra items I needed were two screws to mount the clamp on the vertical bar which I got at the local hardware store.

Panorama Head Parts and Assembly

Here are the parts and their sequential assembly. If I can put this together, anybody can!

Using the mounting screws on the horizontal bar, attach the vertical bar to it
Mount the clamp on the vertical bar, I had to use a couple of screws from the hardware store
Insert the nodal point slider into the clamp
Mount the click-stop rotator on your leveled tripod head
Mount the panorama head assembly on the click-stop rotator
Mount the camera on the nodal point slider
Done!

Assemble the horizontal and vertical bars

Insert the nodal point slider into the clamp

Mount the click-stop rotator on the head then the pano head

Mount the camera on the nodal point slider

A New Infrared Camera: Canon M5

April 20, 2018 by A. Cemal Ekin

I have been doing infrared photography for quite a while now which started with a Canon G7 point-and-shoot converted for this purpose. With that camera, I took many photographs from the window of commercial airplanes as I flew from Providence to Salt Lake City over a course of four years. Eventually, that collection, Infrared Earthscapes, got published in the LensWork Magazine in December 2011.

Previous Infrared Cameras

Just a little before the publication of my Infrared Earthscapes collection, I replaced my infrared camera with a Canon Rebel T2i so that I could use different lenses on it and that camera gave me many photographs until late last year. My main challenge with the first one was the small image sizes and the lack of raw format images. The second one produced a different challenge with the focusing process. The DSLR format cameras normally use a secondary light path for focusing than the one actually hitting the sensor unless the live view mode is used. Although a solution, that proved to be difficult to use most of the time because outdoors the live view is very difficult to view let alone carefully focus.

Mirrorless Cameras Have Infrared Advantages

I decided to replace my last infrared camera with a mirrorless one since the focus is always done on the actual image capturing sensor and is as precise as it needs to be. The logical choice for me was a Canon M5 since I had been using one since its introduction. I found a refurbished unit on the Canon store at a good price and purchased it a couple of months ago.

I had the other two cameras converted to infrared at LifePixel and was generally satisfied with the results and decided to use their services again. Other than an unfortunate mistake on their part the battery lid required excessive force to open and closed, which caused me to send the camera back for service. They found that one screw was loose! I am not sure how, but they left it not properly tightened so the second service was easy but cost me $60 extra in shipping charges. Now, all is good.

(Note on 5/25/2018: I guess LifePixel was expecting me not to mention this snafu on their site, they strangely refunded $5 to me probably triggered by my review in which I mentioned the extra shipping cost. Petty! And, I no longer have faith in their work or judgment.)

(Note on 5/28/2018: The principal of LifePixel contacted me via e-mail to set up a phone appointment which we did. Due to some personal reasons, he missed it twice and on the third time, he offered his apologies for not handling the matter better. I told him that I was not asking for a refund but simply narrating the story with an ending “Now, all is good.” He also told me that they refunded my extra shipping cost of $60 as a gesture of goodwill. Had they not made that $5 refund all would still be good. I accepted his apology, goodwill will take time. I have donated the $60 to RI Center for Photographic Arts.)

Lightroom Has Become More Infrared Friendly

I have been trying to take some experimental photographs since I got it back as the weather and my health permitted. In the meantime, the new release of the Lightroom Classic CC and Adobe Camera Raw added features that made processing infrared images a lot easier than before as I wrote in a recent post. Here, I am sharing some photographs that I took back in March in the Roger Williams Park and this afternoon at the Garden City Shopping Center. I thank the staff of the Pottery Barn store for their cooperation and allowing me to photograph in the store.

Sample Photographs

You will find a mix of photographs in terms of subject matter and processing. Take them as the result of my experiments in infrared photography. Keep in mind that even when the photograph is in color and some parts may even look normal, all the colors are false colors. That’s the nature of infrared photography!

Infrared Channel Swapping in Lightroom

April 13, 2018 by A. Cemal Ekin

Lightroom has had some weaknesses when it came to processing infrared images like channel swap and white balance. The primary problem has been and continues to be the range of white balance options not being wide enough into the blue end of the slider. That has had a fix for quite some time which I will quickly outline here for completeness. The second shortcoming, although not an issue for me, is the inability to swap the red and the blue channels which results in blueish skies and yellowish foliage. That had to be done in Photoshop, until the latest release of Lightroom.

The stacked images you see in the opening of this article are all done in Lightroom, including the one that has the blue sky. That is the result of the newly added capability to Adobe Camera Raw to create extensive and flexible camera profiles that can also optionally make use of the Lookup Tables (LUT.) It is this newly acquired capability allowed me to create a camera profile for my infrared-modified Canon M5 that allows me to swap the red and the blue channels without constantly going to Photoshop and retaining the workflow completely nondestructive because there is no need to open a pixel version of the image in Photoshop. Interested? Read on! Although the content may conceptually sound geeky, procedurally it is a breeze to follow, don’t let the jargon fool you. The steps are very easy to follow.

A Camera Profile for Better White Balance Control

Although the following part can be done without this first step, going through this simple procedure will give you much better control on the white balance of your IR images. Even if you create a custom white balance in camera by photographing green grass or foliage, the white balance sliders in Lightroom do not have the range of adjustment to display that or even tweak further. Follow these steps with no thinking, at least initially:

Take a photograph of a grassy patch or green foliage of a plant with good coverage
Using your camera controls, set this image to be used for Custom White Balance
Take a few photographs showing some foliage and other subjects
Download Adobe DNG Profile Editor from their site, Mac, and Windows versions, even a short tutorial available there. It is an oldie but goodie! We are interested in doing one thing here, extending the range of the Color slider in Lightroom, nothing else
If you have not yet done it yet, in Lightroom, select the image you want to use for this purpose and export it to DNG, note the file location on your drive.
Open the IR photograph you prepared in step 5 from your camera in the DNG Profile Editor, any photo you took in step 3 will do. Depending on your camera brand and the white balance settings you will see something similar but not exactly identical to what I show in the images below.
Look for a tab on the top right “Color Matrices” and click on it to show the sliders
Move the “White Balance Calibration” Temperature slider down to -100 (Note: My original instructions indicated to move the Blue Primary Saturation slider to -100 and I did my work that way. However, for some reason, that does not work anymore! Sorry for the confusion I might have created. The profiles I created at the time of writing the original article look and work differently from the one I created in this “corrected” process. I will further study what might have changed and will update the post accordingly.)
Click on the “Options” tab and write a descriptive name for this profile
Now, click on File/Export and export this profile to a known folder
Close the DNG Profile Editor
Open the File Explorer and go to the folder where you saved the new profile and highlight it by clicking on it once
Press Ctrl-C to copy it to the clipboard
Navigate to C:\Users\<your name>\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\CameraRaw\CameraProfiles
Press Ctrl-V to paste the file into this folder
Restart Lightroom

Now in Lightroom, navigate to one of your IR images taken in step 3. How it will look is anybody’s guess, but navigate to the Profile Browser in its new location of the Basic Panel. You should see under the “Profiles” group, the new profile you created similar to my screen capture shows. You will see in my screen capture other profiles, stay tuned for those. Click on the new profile you created and then on “Close” to exit the profile browser. You should now see a very usable set of white balance sliders most likely showing “As Shot” setting. The following images should help following the steps above:

Up to this point, we have converted the unusable white balance sliders to fully functional ones that reflect the camera settings. Now, let us see how we can do the red-blue channel swap. I will not go too much into creating and using camera profiles in Lightroom and ACR as plenty have been written on the subject. I will mainly focus on one specific profile creation that will bring the ability to swap the Red and the Blue channels to achieve results like the ones below. All three images are direct export from Lightroom virtual copies of the same raw file.

Color Lookup Tables (LUT)

The idea of using LUTs for various purposes has been around from monitor profile and calibration to applying particular looks to video files. A LUT consists of a series of color values that link the measured to desired with the necessary adjustment so that they look as desired. It is a color mapping process. The new profiling capabilities in Adobe Camera Raw along with the ability to export a series of adjustments in Photoshop as Color Lookup Tables give us the ability to apply a set of adjustments once in the exclusive domain of Photoshop to the images in Lightroom. Although I will focus on processing infrared images, the same concept can be used to create profiles for other purposes as well.

Let us create first the necessary lookup table in Photoshop. For this purpose, I used three different images with no visible difference in the exported LUT, a regular color photograph, an infrared photograph, a file with a simple black background. Photoshop seems to be exporting the changes contained in the adjustment layers rather than any image content which probably makes sense. That said, for the purpose of visual consistency, I will use the same infrared image shown above as my base image, either raw or any other format.

Open the image you want to use for this purpose in Photoshop
Add a Channel Mixer adjustment layer
Select the Red channel, lower the Red value to zero and increase the Blue value to +100
Select the Blue channel, lower the Blue value to zero and increase the Red value to +100
You should now see the image with the altered colors
Now go to File/Export/Color Lookup Tables
Add a description, optionally add a copyright notice, leave other options as you see in the screen capture
Click to save and give it a descriptive name in a folder you can easily locate. Congratulations you now have the Channel Swap LUT ready to use
Open the raw image in Adobe Camera Raw by noting the file name and directly opening it from Photoshop rather than sending it from Lightroom. This will launch ACR and load the raw image
Click on the Presets tab at the top, and while holding the Alt key, click on the New Profile icon (next to the trash can, be careful) at the bottom
In the pop-up dialog window, give the profile a name, leave the default location as User Profiles, and put a checkmark in the box next to Color Lookup Table in the bottom block
Navigate to the folder where you saved the LUT in step #8 and load that file
Click OK to save the profile, it is now ready to use instantly in ACR
Load Lightroom and find the raw file you have been working with
In the Basic Panel, click on Profile Navigator, scroll down to see User Profiles, locate the new profile
As you move your cursor over the profile preview thumbnail you will see your image assuming that look. Now, click on that thumbnail to apply the profile.
You are now working with the image with its Red and Blue channels swapped. Adjust to taste.

Here are the sequential screen captures that correspond to the steps in this section for reference.

Additional Notes

I have experimented with several options and would like to share my conclusions. You may or may not agree with them, but they may point you in some additional directions to try different settings.

In creating the initial camera profile using the DNG Profile editor, the recommended setting for the Blue Primary saturation is -100 in many articles I have read. I did try other values, -50 and -75 and have seen subtle differences. Simply create three different DCP profiles and see how they behave in Lightroom for your taste. The only cost is the few extra minutes of saving them.
Read the DNG Profile Editor tutorial, it has many other paths to follow for different and even better results in your IR camera profiles. There is a very short segment about this in the manual/tutorial.
The creation of a Color Lookup Table in Photoshop will accommodate multiple adjustment layers and their impact on the image. I thought it might be a good idea to add a curves adjustment layer and apply different levels of contrast on top of the Channel Mixer. I found this to be helpful with moderate and strong contrast curves for quick results.
Additional settings may be applied in the ACR to be saved as part of the same profile such as pulling all the saturation sliders in the HSL panel to -100 to save time in Lightroom to convert the image to B&W. I found this to be a little confusing because all the sliders will remain in the middle but there will be no saturation. To regain the saturation they need to be pushed to +100 essentially shortening the slider travel distance. Sliders remaining unmoved in Lightroom may be of benefit for some sliders but not all, at least not for me.
If you apply the Channel Swap profile and then want to adjust the darkness of the sky or other color channels, remember they are no longer where they were before. To darken the sky you will most likely use the Red, Orange, and Yellow sliders. Likewise, the foliage may be found in the Blue, Purple, or Magenta.

Summary

The new Lightroom and ACR updates provide additional capabilities in creating and using camera profiles. The few simple features explored in the article will be welcome by most infrared photography fans. The following photograph is a panoramic stitch done in Lightroom and then adjusted using the processes outlined above without opening it in Photoshop.

A Leica Older than I

May 25, 2017 by A. Cemal Ekin

When I was in elementary school, my father worked at the Sariyar Dam construction project. It was in the middle of nowhere and I got to spend a little time one summer there and my sister and I stayed in Istanbul with my grandmother as we attended school. I remember a few things from the limited time I spent in Sariyar company housing with nary a thing other than a dozen or so houses. I was amazed to see a strip of tape on spools passing through a gap and playing music, like magic! That was my first encounter with a tape recorder/player. I also remember that it was VERY hot, and it was outright stupid to walk barefoot with a couple of other kids some distance, but I did it! Then, I remember one of my father’s friends, Valentin who showed us how he made prints in a darkroom while he sipped vodka. I was mesmerized and hooked. My father bought a Leica camera, probably from Valentin which looked like a jewel to me. But, I was not allowed to play with it for a long time. And, when I was old enough to do that, I found it frustrating to load film from the bottom. It jammed more often than not, and because we bought hand-loaded film, we did not get good results from the camera. Perhaps there was also something wrong with it, who knows.

Much later, when I was in high school, and later in college, I made numerous attempts to use the Leica still without much success. Probably in my second year in college, my friend Mehmet and I visited a friend in a small village in Thrace. He was fulfilling his military obligation by serving as an elementary school teacher in the tiny village of Doganca. Before the visit, I borrowed a Voigtlander camera from my uncle and took my first bunch of photographs that received very strong comments and encouragements from the family and friends. The year was probably 1962 or 1963 and I believe we visited Doganca once more. I submitted the best frames, about 6-8 to a competition held by one of the newspapers in Turkey, Cumhuriyet. Although I recall having received some mention, I never received the negatives back!

Encouraged by the outcome of my photographic experiments, I convinced my parents that I needed to buy a reliable camera and with some help, I got a Flexaret twin-lens reflex camera which I used for quite a few years and still own in operating condition. The missing piece was a light meter and I traded in the Leica for a light-meter at a camera store in the Sirkeci district. I was off to the wonderful world of photography and used the Felexaret TLR and the Yashica light-meter for some years. But, the Flexaret and the Leica parted ways, and I would regret that decision years later and look for ways to get my hands on a similar Leica. I took the Flexaret to Doganca later on.

About a couple of months ago my friend Dennis mentioned that when his wife Chris’ father passed away he left an old Leica and he was wondering what to do with it. I suggested having it serviced and sell it on eBay, but after some looking around he found that like most film cameras even a Leica lost value. I offered to buy it from him to have it serviced and keep. A few weeks later he and Chris came to pick us up to go out to eat and he brought the Leica and told me that they decided to give it to me as a gift! It was in reasonably good condition with some shutter speeds obviously off, but I was delighted.

Yesterday, I took the Leica and visited Youxin Ye who worked on Leicas for a couple of friends. He specializes in Leica film camera service and nothing else. I had called and set up an appointment for around 1:30 PM and my friend Jim joined me for the 50-minute ride to Canton, MA. We arrived a little early as Ye was working on a fire-damaged Leica M3. Their living room floor was covered with piles of boxes coming in or going out, filled with some Leica equipment. Working on a kitchen table covered with tools and supplies, Ye and his wife greeted us with a warm welcome and showed us the seats at the table.

His stained hands, with no sign of shake, moved to pick up the tiniest screw or any other part with confidence and precision coming from having done the same thing for twenty years, quite possibly at the same table. As he finished working on the M3, he passed it to his wife to put a new leather cover on it. As he took the lens off my new Leica, she was carefully dressing up the M3 which would look practically brand new after she was finished with it.

Ye disassembled the lens, put the main parts on a plastic lid, and passed them to his wife for cleaning. Then, he started removing tiny screws, parts, knobs, etc., and in short order, the Leica shed its “outerwear” that appeared to be of a unibody design. The table in front of him was covered with the parts from the camera while his wife very carefully brushed the lens threads and other parts with some kind of cleaning liquid which we later learned to be break cleaner for cars.

A former accountant for Liberty Mutual, he got interested in learning Leica service and repair to bring back to life a camera his father owned. He said it took him about a week to take that first camera apart. I shared the story of my father’s Leica, and we chatted on a variety of subjects as we waited and watched the husband and wife service the 1938 Leica IIIa. It was in a good shape but started looking even better with some deep cleaning. After the cleaning, Ye started putting the parts together as if playing a video in reverse with equally precise and confident moves.

After a while, Ye stopped and declared it was time for a break and showed us the stairs going to the basement. There, he pointed to the shelves filled with various kinds of refreshments from water to power drinks. He lit a cigarette and checked his e-mail while Jim and I viewed various curiosity items, like the full skin and taxidermied head of a Bengal tiger! He said he bought it on eBay before it got regulated. As we came upstairs, the mailman stopped his truck in front of the house and Ye’s wife went out to deliver some packages and brought back a bunch. Ye started opening a pair of longish boxes taped together and Jim asked what was in them. “Knives,” he said, “Buck knives” and opening one of the box he pulled out a rather large hunting knife, another thing he collected. Later he added, he also collected watches like Hamilton but was wearing a Citizen I believe.

He told us that he serviced and repaired Leica cameras for many well-known camera stores and could hardly keep up with the work. The boxes on the floor were piled depending on whether they were from dealers and camera stores or from individuals. After playing with the pair of knives, it was time to finish my Leica. He fiddled with various adjustments, put the camera up to his eye while pushing on the little lever inside to make sure that the rangefinder segments were lined up. Then, using an electronic gizmo on the table he tested the shutter speeds and declared all to be well within the tolerances.

He put the lens on its mount, then had to take it apart to reverse a ring. After all was said and done, the Leica was all in one piece and he kept winding and releasing the shutter, click, click, clll-liiick, … the sweet sound of a film rangefinder shutter! I paid him for his service and we headed back home. The diverging roads between the Flexaret and the Leica converged again. Thank you, Chris and Dennis, for a very fine and meaningful gift you gave me. Thank you, Ye, for bringing it back to the fully functional state.

If you have a Leica in need of service, sooner or later it will end up in Ye’s hands which he uses like a precision instrument. You are far better off driving to visit the Ye residence with your camera and watch him work his magic. Visit his website for contact information and be prepared to spend about 3-4 hours there. But, look at those boxes and think how long you may wait if you ship your Leica to him!

Below are the photographs I took during the repair session and earlier today and I am happy to share them with you with the permission of the Leica master himself!

This and That, Dogs and Cats

March 10, 2017 by A. Cemal Ekin

This post contains a few pieces of information I wanted to share with all who follow this blog. Nothing earth-shattering, mind you, just a few things I stumbled upon, about dogs and cats, and a couple of useful services. Enjoy what matters to you, ignore the rest.

Online Storage

Online storage has become a useful tool for various reasons and we all have some, like DropBox, Copy (alas shut down,) iCloud, and so on. They offer you a modest storage space which can be expanded if you bring your friends through referrals. But the starting space is generally small. Of course, Google Drive is available to anyone who has a Gmail account and starts at 15GB of shared space with mail, photos, drive.

Recently, I have stumbled upon MEGA which will start the storage space at a whopping 50GB! You can share files or folders with other MEGA users, and there is even a chat function among its users. If you want to stake out your 50GB, point your browser to their Web site at: https://mega.nz. Did I say that it has a high level of security, and there are extensions for FireFox and Chrome which make upload and downloads more convenient? There is no referral program to increase your storage capacity beyond referring to your pocket to get a paid version!

Another storage related piece of information I would like to share is IRISTA. I am not sure how to pronounce the name, “ee-rist-ah” or “eye-rist-ah” but it is offered by Canon Europe and allows you to store photographs. The starting point of storage is 15GB, or that’s how I started a couple of years back when it was in beta version. You can store large size images, but the organization skills are minimal like reordering the photographs. But, it is eminently capable of displaying and sharing your photographs. I do not know if it is available only to Canon photographers or to anyone, but check it out at https://www.irista.com.

Dogs and Cats

Almost all photographers or photography fans know Edward Weston as one of the seminal figures in photography. He is well-known for his photographs of Point Lobos, dunes, landscapes, and nudes. But, did you know that he was a big cat fan and photographed many a cat to include in his vast collection of work? One of his cats is on top of this post and you may have seen occasional cat photos I might have included in a post featuring Sotheby’s photo auctions. If you like to see more of Weston and his cats, visit this post on the Website Cultural Cat.

From cats to dogs, we are really enjoying Karma. He is a laid-back, cool dude; does not bark much (maybe yet!) and sleeps through the night. He is still fuzzy with puppy hair and has not had any grooming beyond combing we do. We are waiting for George to strip him, which is the dog groomers’ jargon for pulling his hair a clump at a time. It sounded too painful to me and I asked George how he handles them while stripping the dogs. To my surprise, he said, “oh, most of them fall asleep as I strip them!” I cannot wait to see Karma groomed and his beard fully grown and dangling below his chin. His eyebrows are growing although they are still a little unruly, going in many different directions.

Your Display Profile May Be Wrong

March 24, 2016 by A. Cemal Ekin

How is that for a bold statement! But it may very well be true, even if you do it regularly on schedule. Display calibration and profiling is a must for all digital photographers. There is no escaping that if you want to produce an accurate representation of your work not only on your monitor but on the Internet, in competitions, on your friends’ monitors, mobile devices, and so on. Clearly, you cannot control the quality of the displays in front of the millions of users all over the world. But you can do your best and provide accurate information. This becomes particularly important and immediately visible if you print your work, yourself or printed at a lab.

Monitor Calibration

There are many devices in the market, presumably all capable of bringing the colors on your monitor where they are supposed to be. I have been using a calibration device for 18-20 years, starting with Monaco Optix XR, then a ColorMunki Photo, finally an i1Display Pro. They are all in the X-Rite products stable. There are other models and other brands, the prices have come down considerably and there is no excuse for not using one anymore. They all come with their drivers and calibration software which, in a layperson language, display a series of known color values and reads the displayed value. If they differ, the software creates a profile, something like a lookup table, that makes the corrections on the fly. This part is familiar to everyone.

Luminance Setting for Screen

One of the adjustments, in fact, one of the critical choices in this process is the luminance level of the monitor. This is worth looking for in a calibration device before picking one up, make sure it allows different luminance levels for the monitor. If you use a calibration device and do not see this in the interface, try first switching to “Advanced” mode even though this could be a little more involved process. The screen luminance is measured in candela per meter squared (cd/m²). When you find a drop-down selector with this unit next to it, you have found a critical piece of adjustment in your calibration process.

The question is what is the right level of monitor luminance? The definitive answer is: It depends. Depends on your environment, how bright a room you work in, whether there are windows in your view or behind you, the wall colors, etc. I have a post discussing your digital work environment that is worth a look. If your monitor luminance is too bright, a properly exposed image will look too bright and you will make it darker to look correct on the screen. This will make your image project darker in competitions, and produce darker prints. The opposite is also true. If your monitor is too dark, a normally exposed image will look too dark and you will brighten it, resulting in too bright a projection in the competition or lighter than normal prints will result.

Print Viewing Light is Essential Equipment

This adjustment will take a little empirical effort to get it under control. First, make sure that your environment is as controlled as you can make it, shade the windows, use monitor hoods, etc. Then, this is also very critical and often ignored, get yourself a proper viewing light for your prints. There are lights color experts swear by, Solux is one of them. If you are handy you can build a print viewing booth using Solux lights. I have been using several Ottlite daylight balanced lights for quite a few years and, although their spectrum may not be perfect, they are close enough for my purposes. The important things to remember are:

It should be daylight balanced or very close to it
If possible, a dimmer will help
You use this light to view and evaluate ALL your prints

The next hurdle is: how do we compare the screen to a print and make the luminance adjustment on the monitor? By using a standard image, not one of yours. There are many images on the Internet, the Kodak Imagedisc test image is a good one to download and use for this purpose. I downloaded one from Dry Creek Photo Web site, follow this link to download it and unzip the file. You will find a couple of PDF files and a JPEG image file which will be the standard we will use. (The image on the left is reduced for screen display, do not use it for print testing.)

Open the test image in Photoshop or other software you use to edit images. Make sure that there are no adjustments are applied by way of autoprocessing on import or the like. Now, print this image on an 8×10″ paper with proper workflow and color management. When the print is finished take it to your viewing light, if possible next to your monitor while shielding it from the light. Look at the print, look at the monitor. Do they look the same? Is one brighter or darker than the other?

If the print is darker, then your monitor is too bright
If the print is lighter, then your monitor is too dark

Get your calibration device, start the software and look for the luminance adjustment. If you left it at its default and you are using an i1Display Pro, it may be at 120 Candela /m². You may need to adjust this up or down. In the case of #1, lower the luminance by 20-40 units, calibrate the monitor and look at the print again, no need to produce another print. After a couple of iterations, you will get them to look sufficiently similar if not outright identical.

Empirical Luminance Measurement (imprecise but useful)

There are measurement instruments that will give a precise answer to this question, they are not easily accessible. So, I have improvised yet another empirical approach to assess the luminance levels.

Bring your camera out, take a picture of the image displayed on the screen in manual mode. Try ISO 800, f/5.6 at 1/60 second exposure, or what your camera indicates while you are in the manual mode. Then, with exactly the same setting photograph the print under the viewing light making sure that the light is at a distance of normal viewing. My viewing light was at about 18″ and at a slight angle and it is not as even as I would like. You can see a little glare on the right side of the print photo, no problem though. Try to set this distance that makes the print look the same as the screen, within reason of course. It will be somewhere between 1-2 feet from the print. These are my results, not bad if I may say so myself!

My viewing light was at about 18″ and at a slight angle and it is not as even as I would like. You can see a little glare on the right side of the print photo, no problem though. Try to set this distance that makes the print look the same as the screen, within reason of course. It will be somewhere between 1-2 feet from the print. These are my results, not bad if I may say so myself!

Now, compare the photographs. Your eyes are extraordinarily adaptable to changing light levels. Using the camera in the manual setting will record different images that you can compare on your screen. Viewing them side by side will allow reading values from the same locations of each to compare. Now, before you jump on my neck that this is imprecise, let me say “this is imprecise” as a measurement. It is only a tool that is at our disposal that removes part of the subjectivity of our eyes because of their huge adaptability. But ultimately you will make a judgment using your eyes every time you make a print, this is only to find the optimum level of luminance for your monitor and editing environment.

Get to work! This will take a little time. But, you will love the results and know that the results of your edits are going to be accurate.

Sweet? No, Sour! HP Spectre x360

January 15, 2016 by A. Cemal Ekin

Summary: HP Spectre x360 Is a Lemon! Details? Read below and in the previous article linked.

(Read the two updates at the end, I added them after HP contacted me.)

I wrote about the problems I had with a new HP Spectre x360, and I thought that was the end. Someone from HP sent me an e-mail after that post to tell me that a new case manager would contact me to resolve my problems. That was a surprise, a welcome one, but still a surprise. Let me state at the outset for those who do not know me, I am a technology person who owned two computer companies, installed large-scale networks, sold many computers, trained many users. So, I am not coming from the novice side of the issues but the expert side. I still have consulting clients and a lot of friends who come to me for computer advice.

Even the knowledgeable people can have difficulties if the companies are intent on creating problems, in more ways than one. Despite their claims that there are no problems like those I reported, if you search the Internet, you will find a large number of questions related to the matters I have been mentioning. For instance “hp spectre x360 screen crash” yields 111,000 results on Google, “hp spectre x360 trackpad issues” 57,000, “hp spectre x360 sound problems” will present a whopping 285,000 hits as of January 14, 2016.

Read on, especially if you are considering an HP product.

The new case manager whom I knew only as Jennifer was a true professional and genuinely interested in helping the customer rather than defending the company and a faulty product. By that time, I had had several conversations with a different case manager, a support person looked at the computer via remote connection, the laptop went to a service center and returned after 11 days the same way. Jennifer understood the difficulties I went through and offered to replace the computer. Since I was going on a three-week vacation we agreed to pick the conversation up upon my return towards the end of November 2015. After my return home, one call to Jennifer was enough to arrange for the replacement computer to be sent with a shipping label for the old one to be mailed back to HP. I was hopeful that the new computer would solve my problems. Alas!

Yet Another Case Manager

The problems continued, sound system would quit, and still does, at random times; the touch pad two-finger scroll would change direction; the WiFi would decide to disconnect; and this one introduced a new problem the Intel HD display driver would crash in the middle of doing something and “recover” with a blank screen. Most of these problems would require rebooting the computer, sometimes even twice.

I called support and after some wait, I was connected to a support staff in India who connected to my computer remotely and updated a slew of drivers, from sound to display to touch pad although the HP Support Assistant, the resident software for tracking such things, did not show any new updates. He offered to call back in 3-4 days and was on time to do so. Unfortunately, in the meantime, the computer continued with the problems and I reported the situation to him. He transferred me to another agent, who in turn brought me in touch with yet another case manager, and I know him only as Christian.

Christian listened to my story, the problems which I have been repeating over and over despite the fact that they were supposed to keep a record of it. After going through the same gyrations I asked if I could return this computer and receive my money back. He indicated that according to the company policies the computer had to be seen by a technician and noticing my unwillingness to ship it once more with all data cleared from it for security and be without a laptop for 10-12 days again, he offered to arrange an authorized HP technician to make a house call. I indicated to Christian that if the technician validated my problems, I would like that to be the end and receive my refund for the computer. Clearly, the starting point is mistrusting the consumer, even after so many calls and problems reported.

Authorized HP Technician Arrives

HP Spectre x360 is a lemon — Technician’s report documenting the problems

At the arranged time, the authorized HP technician arrived and I handed the laptop to him. He was surprised that many things were not functioning, and reported to the person who authorized to open the case that when he arrived “nothing was working.” After obtaining approval from HP on the phone (see the image on the left), he opened the computer and looked at the connections, unplugged a few and plugged them back and restarted the computer.

Spectre Screen Crash — Note the Windows version

During his visit the screen crashed once, the sound was not working, and he observed for a brief moment the trackpad problem. After writing his report and taking a photograph of it for his records he left the original with me and left, the report is on the left. Before he left though, he called Christian and reported to him everything he saw, then put me on to talk with the case manager. I repeated my request to return the computer and receive my money back. He said he would get back to me at a certain time on a certain day.

Another Missed Call by HP and an Offer In Writing With Two Bad Choices

I waited for his call. After about an hour passed I sent an e-mail to him to indicate my disappointment in yet another missed call by HP support. He replied and apologized for not calling and asked if he could call back the following day, I agreed. More yada yada … during that conversation and I asked him to send me in writing his offer on how to refund my money. A few days later I received his “offer” which contained one bad offer and one even worse than that. HP would refund part of my money, $930 of the $1,249 I paid for it because they had to prorate the refund to account for my “use” of the computer. The other offer was an HP gift card for $1,230 with which I could buy another HP product.

I told Christian that making me pay for the faults in their computer was not fair at all and I had spent an inordinate amount of time dealing with not only the computer problems but also dealing with the customer support. Furthermore, prorating the value of anything requires an agreed upon life of the item. Judging by the amount they deducted, 25%, they assumed a two-year or less life for this laptop. My laptops last a good deal longer than that, and perhaps it was telling how much HP trusted their equipment. I told him that I would get back to him with my decision and that neither of the offers was attractive to me.

I Declined The Offer, Reserving My Rights For Legal Action

On January 14, 2016, I wrote an e-mail to Christian and told him that HP’s practice of beating consumers to submission did not amount to customer service. By simply offering bad and even worse choices they rig the system to discourage the consumer from pursuing it further. He called me the same day and I repeated to him that I would decline both offers but retain my rights to pursue legal action if I so chose. He repeated the false claim that “he was there to help me,” and I told him that he may only contact me if HP agreed to pay me the full amount to take the computer back, we parted ways.

This is my second horrendous experience with HP and from now on I will erase it from my evoked set of products if I am in need of something, anything, they produce. I should have trusted my first experience. But, superficial reviewers who tend to write to get traffic to their Web sites rather than truly inform the consumer fooled me. Shame on them too.

A Review Rejected, Surprise!

In the meantime, I wrote a review on HP Web site about this product which they offer to anyone. I read their guidelines and did not use any obscenities, mention any names, did not include any spam, or any links, I stuck to the problems I had with the computer. Yesterday, I heard from the review approval team that my review did not follow their guidelines and therefore could not be published. I replied and asked to see where I violated the guidelines, but I am not holding my breath to hear from them. They essentially want good reviews or reviews that talk about trivial problems. Obviously, they do not want to hear real world problems. Furthermore, they don’t want the real problems to be visible to potential buyers.

A Warning to Those Considering HP, Don’t

So, do you still want to buy an HP? Think twice, thrice, look elsewhere, find something else, … This company does not care about product quality or customer service. They want to push the boxes and then push the customers to ignore the problems they are having through a customer service process that has the wrong premise: Protect the company and call it “I am here to help you” service. I say, this is a push-away type of customer service and this is NOT the type of marketing I taught in my 40+ years of academic career.

There is Lemon Law in Rhode Island which provides some level of protection when products continue to fail after repeated attempts to bring them to the expected and promised levels of standards. Using that, I may file a complaint with the state attorney general and follow the guidelines described for this process. That will make more people aware of these problems at an official level. The amount in dispute is within the limits of the small claims court. I can file a suit and seek legal advice from a lawyer before appearing before the judge. HP has to send at least one lawyer to represent them. I may or may not recover my entire cost back. But, that too will inform a lot of potential customers about the problems that may lie ahead.

You are warned! They produce lemons; you cannot even make lemonade from them.

Note: I replaced the original opening, featured image after the second person commenting reminded me that it was the upcoming 15″ model. I was quite surprised at the speed with which he or she found my post within hours from posting and be so quick to recognize the model mistake. I wonder … ;-)

Update February 5, 2016

On January 27 an HP Americas Executive Manager sent me an e-mail asking to talk to me about my case. The next day we spoke on the phone. I told him that unless HP agreed to refund my money I would not talk with him. He said that HP would pay the entire cost of my purchase and buy back the laptop. With some delay, I received the promised FedEx shipping label and took the box to FedEx. Upon receiving the unit they promised to issue a check within 10-15 days. I am waiting. Interestingly, on the shipping label, the value of the item showed as $100! They must be self-insuring against a problem in shipping.

Update February 23, 2016

Finally! The ordeal is over. I shipped the unit on February 2, 2016, and received a check on February 23, 2016, for the full cost of the computer. It took a little longer than expected but I am VERY glad this is now behind me.